


Palestine Wound

by ceria



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Background Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter - Freeform, F/M, M/M, Molly Graham/Will Graham - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-14
Updated: 2016-02-14
Packaged: 2018-05-20 08:50:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,354
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5999692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ceria/pseuds/ceria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Molly wants to know what happened to Will.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Jack

She'd never considered Will a mystery. His old life was shrouded behind a veil, certainly, but Molly never felt like her husband (second one she'd lost now – no, don't think like that yet) was a mystery. She stood outside the walls of the BAU, staring at the ugly building and wondered if she should reconsider how well she knew Will.

Jack Crawford had not returned a single phone call. He might have known she'd taken Wally to Oregon and her parents once word got out that Lecter escaped. She left it alone the first day, assuming Will would be too busy to call her. The past two days she's called every emergency number Will left her -- to no avail.

What she knew about Dr. Hannibal Lecter could fill a shot glass. Maybe a small cup if she was lucky – they'd briefly talked about him two years ago and she wasn't blessed with Will's memory. Not that she wanted to remember that conversation. Will had been drunker than she cared to admit before he'd talked about serial killers, Lecter, and only one sentence about a teenager named Abigail. She'd never followed the tabloids and only caught the highlights on the news about Lecter before she'd met Will.

Will, who had been so scarred and slightly scared the first time she touched him – as if expecting pain to follow the gentleness – and she'd never asked why. Maybe she should have. Then, today, she could be more prepared to deal with _this_. Instead, she'd logged into the internet to a website she'd never visited before in order to read an article by a woman Will hated. An article which said the year of the dragon had ended three days prior, that Francis Dolarhyde had been found dead on a property Lounds was currently trying to trace back to escapee Dr. Hannibal 'the Cannibal' Lecter. It had been the next paragraphs that made her decide to fly to Baltimore however:

_But where is Will Graham? As previously reported, former FBI Investigator Will Graham, who helped capture Lecter three years ago, has been seen multiple times at the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane this past month, presumably speaking with the serial killer. Now that Lecter has escaped, why have there been no sightings of Will Graham? Who, three years ago, traveled overseas outside of FBI consent to find Lecter, which lead to his reportedly peaceful capture at Graham's Virginia home directly following the massacre at Muskrat Farms._

_Special Agent Jack Crawford, head of the BAU, has been in and out of the FBI offices two times since the announcement of Dolarhyde's death. Both Special Agent Price and Special Agent Zeller have come in and out just as many times. The only one missing from their small team is Will Graham. Who hasn't been seen since Lecter's escape._

_Could he be on run with Lecter?_ Again _?_

 

Sometimes you had to take the bull by the horns no matter how scary it seemed. She opened the front door and walked straight to reception. "I'm looking for Jack Crawford," she said, taking off her winter coat, implying she would stay until she had her way.

"He's been in meetings all day," the young man told her, glancing up for only a second before returning to his computer screen. The badge said Smith on it. "Do you have an appointment?"

"I'm not going to need one," she said, opening her purse. Smith tensed, hand flicking to his waist as if to reach for a gun and she wondered again what had happened these past few days. Slowly she removed her wallet, opening it so he could see her picture. "I'm Will Graham's wife."

He stood immediately, hand reaching for the phone; "Price, I need an escort to the front desk."

"Then find one," she heard over the phone, Price must have pressed the speaker button to answer. Smith winced and pulled it away from his ear. "I'm buried – literally – in dragon fairy guts."

"Price," he said again voice lowering as two agents walked by, "Mrs. Will Graham is at the front desk."

"Shit!" Price said in the same loud tone. Molly only knew the name from Lounds' article – part of the same small team Will served. "Zee's hands are clean, he's on his way. Don't let anyone talk to her, Smith."

"Of course," he agreed. He hung up the phone and shifted his weight, one leg to another, as he looked around the lobby. Four agents were present but out of hearing distance. "My condolences," he started, then flinched again when Molly's expression changed. She knew she paled at those words, her eyes going wide. "We've got Agents searching for him, Mrs. Graham, we'll find him, don't worry."

No wonder Jack hadn't called her.

Zee – Special Agent Zeller – seemed surprised by her appearance. He took in her short height, her long hair pulled back in a loose ponytail and her boots, jeans, and three layers of casual shirts with a raised eyebrow. As if he'd been expecting something else when he saw her.

After their brief introduction, he didn't really say much. "You caught the Tooth Fairy?" she asked, trying to get him to talk.

"Dead as a doornail when we found him," Zee said. 

"How'd he die?" she asked, because she wondered if it would make him talk a little more.

"Definitely by Will and Hannibal," he said. "No doubt there."

"Why not?" Molly asked. She hadn't expected him to say it so casually – she'd known that Will had killed in the line of duty before but the way Zee said it… as if not unexpected. What did they all know about her husband that she hadn't known?

"The knife had Will's prints on it," Zee said. "And we don't need to question who ripped his throat out. That was definitely done with a human mouth. Therefore Hannibal." The casual reference to such violence made her shiver. She wished she'd left her coat on now.

"So you know where Will was three days ago?"

"Of course, the video…" he stopped then, turning to look at her, "Has no one contacted you yet?"

"No one," she admitted. "The video?"

"You should speak with Crawford," Zee told her as they exited the elevator. And he wouldn't talk again. 

"I would love to," Molly agreed. 

She recognized Jack instantly – it hadn't been that long since he came to their home. Zee knocked on the glass and the video playing across the conference room immediately paused. She glanced up just before they turned it off. Will's back – clothed in a light shirt with dark streaming across the right shoulder, his hair a mess of curls. 

Were those dark streaks blood? 

"Molly," Jack said, holding out a hand. "I'm sorry I haven't contacted you yet…"

"Are you?" she asked. He'd promised to take care of her husband. She was pretty sure he hadn't done that.

The woman standing behind Jack seemed FBI as well, maybe even his boss. She was thin with tall heels that Molly would never be able to walk in, her dark suit stark against her pale skin and short, blond hair.

"Mrs. Graham," she said, "please join us." It wasn't a request so much as a declaration. Her shark's smile made her wonder if Jack not calling her had been for Molly's benefit after all.

Another woman slid papers across the table toward Molly. "The standard non-disclosure agreement, Mrs. Graham," Kade Prurnell, informed her, pointing to the papers. This felt less like Molly demanding answers to her husband's whereabouts and suddenly more like an inquisition. 

"I'm here because Will hasn't contacted me in three days," Molly said. "What's happened?"

"We cannot answer those questions until you sign," the woman sitting across from her said. She didn't have a visible badge and she felt more like a lawyer than an FBI Agent. 

"Molly, can you sign them, please?" Jack asked. He looked old; he hadn't shaved in a few days, his suit was wrinkled as if he'd worn it for too long, and his eyes were… haunted for lack of a better term. 

She glanced at the blank monitor. "I know that was Will. If I sign these, can I watch that?"

"Yes," Kade said just as Jack said, "You don't want to watch that."

"She needs to watch it," Kade said and Jack sighed, running his hand over his face again. He held his tongue however.

Molly signed.

"It's a narrow view," Kade said. "From what we can tell Dolarhyde turned the camera on to film Lecter's murder."

"Will was there too?" she asked.

"Standing off to the side. Lecter is looking at someone other than Dolarhyde and we don't hear Will speak at first, only…"

"It's graphic," Jack warned, "and there's a lot of blood."

Lecter had taken the time to turn the camera and refocus it while Will was attacked. She knew he was cold-blooded but that struck her as horrible. Who did that? Biting the inside of her cheek, she watched Will get stabbed again. The camera slightly out of focus but it allowed to see how Lecter and Will (she barely recognized her husband in these shots) fought together to bring him down. 

"How much of that blood is Will's?" she asked. Her voice sounded steadier than it felt. In the background, behind the body, she could see Will try and stumble to his feet, motioning toward Lecter to help him. 

Jack stopped the video just as Lecter reached out to him.

"Enough that he'd need to replenish it," Jack admitted.

"Is that the end of the video?" Molly asked. Kade shook her head no and Jack nodded yes. "Let me see the rest," she whispered. 

"The fight's over," Jack tried to tell her. "You've seen enough."

"You can't find Will, can you?" Molly asked. "Let me see the rest."

Wild dogs had attacked them almost two years ago. The three of them had been walking through the woods, coming back from fishing. Will had had a gun and hadn't fired right away. Moly had taken the gun away and fired toward the pack, scattering them. He'd been upset and shaking, had even told her he was sorry he couldn't defend them.

That Will? Was not the Will she just watched on video. Her husband disliked physical contact and rarely reached for anyone. Wally usually had to hug him. It had taken Will _months_ before he reached for Molly first. She thought about Freddie Lounds' words. Asking if Will could be on the run with Lecter again. Prior to this video she would have laughed.

Now, she watched a fuzzy version of Will Graham reach for Lecter, embrace him, and rest his head against his chest. Then they disappeared.

"Where did they go?"

"Over the side of the cliff," Jack said. He sounded brittle and old and very tired. "We've been dredging the ocean looking for them, even threw a couple test dummies over the side to see what happened to them."

She wanted to ask if the dummies had been tied together to keep it more accurate. She bit the inside of her mouth instead.

"Did Will ever receive any letters from Hannibal?" Kade asked. 

It was the first question of many, Molly answered them all. Then, after each answer, wondered if what she knew accurately matched the truth.


	2. Freddie

A good night's sleep helped. Jack had booked her a nearby hotel room and Molly had showered, crawled into bed, and then called Wally to tell him good night. All perfectly normal. Sort of. 

She woke early, heading downstairs for coffee and pastries before Jack arrived to claim her for another day of questions. How crazy would it be to disassemble everything Will had ever said to her? At what point did she stop comparing the man in the video to the man she married? She'd tear herself apart second-guessing everything.

Will had been traumatized before they met. She'd seen emotional wounds like that before but unlike her friends, Will didn't want to talk about it. Molly believed words helped accept the pain and move past it. Will believed in burying it -- the deeper the better. He'd never let it heal but it hadn't felt like a gaping wound in their marriage. 

So she'd let him ignore it because he didn't drink too much except on rare occasion, worked steadily, never scared her, helped her with her home, spent time with Wally, and was a good husband. You couldn't fake those traits for two long years. She didn't consider the fact that Lecter had fooled all of the people for several years. The two weren't comparable. She had married Will, slept in his bed, sat by his side to pay the bills, had worried over Wally's grades with him, had fished and played baseball with him. Will had loved her – Molly didn't doubt that.

A woman stirred sugar into her coffee and sat at the table next to her, taking a bite out of a raspberry-filled pastry, the same as Molly's. "Good morning!" she whispered.

"Hi," Molly said, sipping her coffee. The news this morning covered a fire in a suburb of Baltimore.

"Thank God," the woman muttered and Molly raised an eyebrow at her. She pointed to the screen. "It's disturbing to keep hearing about that man who escaped. The world goes on, you know?"

"Oh yes," Molly agreed. She pushed all thoughts of the cliff out of her mind for now.

"Those kinds of things keep you up at night?" she asked, glancing at Molly. "You ever wonder if you're going to open your eyes and find someone standing over you, holding a knife in his hands?"

Molly snorted with laughter, "No." The few nights after Dolarhyde came after them Molly had been too drugged to dream. Those nightmares were over now. 

"Really?" she drawled. "Because I'd be worried about such a thing, if, say… I was married to Lecter's chosen partner and all."

"Excuse me?" Molly asked, just as the woman's friendly smile changed to something predatory. 

"You _are_ Mrs. Will Graham, are you not? And you're telling me you aren't afraid that Hannibal Lecter might stop by your cozy home some night and reclaim what is his? The man you borrowed from him while he was in jail?"

"Ms. Lounds," Molly said, rolling her eyes. "You have a flair for the dramatic, don't you? Stop being ridiculous."

"But you never met Hannibal, did you?" Freddie continued. "Never ate dinner at his table, never watched him work side-by-side with Will? Never saw them with Abigail, even. He'd already killed her by the time you two met."

At the girl's name, Molly couldn't hide her sudden head tilt. Her interest in the name – the one thing Will only mentioned once and with such pain that she couldn't bear to ask about it again. "My husband isn't a serial killer, or an accessory to one, Freddie, and I have nothing to say to you."

"I met Abigail," Freddie continued, "several times. She was a sweet young girl on the verge of becoming a beautiful young woman. Hannibal and Will treated her so interestingly – protecting as if they were her parents. Did you know they were her legal guardians? Apparently Hannibal arranged all of it. 

"Don't you have a son, Mrs. Graham? How did Will treat him?"

Molly stood, she'd rather wait in her room than subject herself to this. "Just one more question," Freddie said. "Have you ever compared notes with Dr. Bedelia Du Maurier? You know… apples to apples as their spouses?"

Lecter had been married? She hadn't known that. Molly took a deep breath and glanced down; it was a shame her cup was empty. Freddie Lounds would look better with scalding coffee poured over her head. Not that Molly would do that – but the thought was entertaining at least. "I have no comment, Freddie."

Returning to her room, Molly considered Freddie's words. She had her own edges left raw from Will's disappearance and Freddie seemed to know all the ways to tear them a little more. She didn't want to be like Jack Crawford, whose ragged edges tore more and more until nothing was left of the original work. Just tattered strips of the man he'd used to be.

Molly had Wally to raise; she couldn't afford to let those torn edges expand. So, one more day of questions and then she'd leave, go back to Oregon and back to Wally and start her life over. Again.


	3. Bedelia

In her heart, Molly believed Will was dead. She'd known it days ago when she'd woke, tears in her eyes from a dream about Will saying goodbye. As much as she didn't want it to be true, she considered the video one more time. Will, hurt and bleeding, reaching for Lecter. 

She hadn't known, when she'd told Will to go with Jack and help save people that she was condemning him to death. Not that Will could have done otherwise. He'd have gone no matter what if it meant saving a few lives. There were questions she would never have answers to now. The man that Jack talked about, that Kade asked questions about… he wasn't the same man Molly had married. 

When Will had said he would change she hadn't accepted how much he would change. In her heart, she wanted to believe that he could have come back from this and been the same man she married.

Today, she had some questions of her own. "Who is Dr. Bedelia Du Maurier?" she asked Jack.

"Hannibal's psychiatrist," he answered. "She lived with him in Florence, posing as his wife for several months."

"When was that?"

"While Will recovered in the hospital." Before he'd traveled to Europe to find Lecter then.

Jack almost looked whole today, the edges less ragged. Molly wanted to think she helped with that. That the picture she painted of Will somehow brought Jack a measure of peace. "Can I speak to her?"

The calm faded as soon as she asked that question however. "I don't think that's a good idea," he admitted. 

"Why not?"

"Dr. Du Maurier…" Jack hesitated, obviously considering his words, "she's more like Hannibal than Will. I'm not sure you'd find conversing with her pleasant."

"You're not the only one who needs closure, Jack," Molly said. She'd just have to figure this out on her own then. 

 

The stairs leading to Bedelia's entranceway were slick with snow, as if no one had been to the house in weeks. Or maybe no one had left the house in weeks. Either way the blond woman who opened the door immediately made Molly feel as if she should be wearing armor for this conversation.

"Hello, I'm Molly Graham. I wondered if we could talk for a moment?"

She carried a goblet with her filled with dark red wine, her clothing in perfect order, her shoes clicking on the marble of the foyer as she allowed Molly inside. Like Zeller, Bedelia did a once over, one eyebrow rising at Molly's practical winter coat, jeans, boots and layers of flannel. "Why does everyone look at me that way?" Molly asked, genuinely curious.

"I believe your visage is disconcerting. You dress how Will Graham used to dress prior to his incarceration and… friendship with Hannibal. I suspect that your appearance doesn't match what we expected of Will's wife."

"What did you expect me to look like?"

"Something more… exotic and affluent."

"Something more like Lecter?" Molly asked and Bedelia only took a long sip from her goblet.

"How can I help you?" Bedelia asked.

"I wanted to talk to you about Will."

"I expect your intimate knowledge of your husband exceeds my professional knowledge of him," Bedelia replied. She led Molly into another room, motioning for her to take one of the two chairs facing each other.

"That's the thing," Molly admitted. "The Will Graham Jack Crawford talks about, even the Will Freddie Lounds talks about… well, that isn't my husband."

"Spouses have a different insight into a man than a co-worker. That is to be expected. Marriage is a different type of intimacy as I am sure you know."

"Do you see Lecter different then?" Molly asked.

"Considering I was his drugged consort all those months while Will convalesced? I suspect I saw Hannibal clearer than even Will Graham saw him. After all, I never returned to Hannibal's side."

"Do you know why Will did?" Molly asked. Bedelia might be a snake charmer, Molly could tell that already, but she was intelligent. If she saw Lecter as he was then she probably didn't assume Will was a serial killer, like Freddie did. And she wasn't so close to Will as to be torn apart by him, like Jack had been. 

Molly really wanted an objective opinion about this.

Bedelia took another long drink before answering. "Do you know Plato's theory on soulmates?"

What in the world? "No," Molly said.

"The Egyptian story of Isis and Osiris?"

"I'm afraid not."

"I asked Will if you were aware of their intimate relationship and he said you were aware enough. I believe Will vastly understated that."

" _Their_ intimate relationship?" Molly asked, dreading the answer.

"Between him and Hannibal Lecter. Tell me, Molly, what does intimate mean to you?"

"Sex," Molly replied.

"Intimacy can be sexual in nature but that was not their…" Bedelia paused before continuing, "That was not Will's interpretation of their relationship."

Molly knew then what Will had never told her. Will found two things overwhelmingly intimate; eye contact and touch. She thought again about the video; how Will had been unsteady and reached for Hannibal, who hadn't hesitated to take Will's hand and embrace him.

Will had chosen death. Most likely he'd felt it was the only way to defeat Lecter.

Bedelia leaned back into her chair, assessing Molly. "If I were you, I would run."

"Why?" Molly asked.

"Because Hannibal Lecter isn't a man who shares well. You've been intimate with Will Graham in the only way Hannibal hasn't." Molly could almost hear the silent 'yet' implied by Bedelia. 

"They're dead," Molly said. "I saw the video, I know the FBI has been dragging the cliff and ocean for them and hasn't found them."

"Hannibal has an uncanny habit of defying the odds," Bedelia replied, the words shaky. She looked scared. Molly wondered why. "And where Hannibal goes, you shall find Will Graham."

"You think they're alive?"

"I think it foolish to assume otherwise until two bodies have been positively identified."

"Why are you afraid?" Molly asked.

"The same reason you should be. While you live you stand between them."

"He cared enough to let you pose as his wife and didn't kill you then."

"Hannibal has loved exactly two people in this world," Bedelia admitted. "The first died several years ago and he ate her."

That put a disturbing twist on why Hannibal had tried to kill Will so many times. "You are not the second?"

"I am not the second," Bedelia said.

"Did you meet Will before Lecter's incarceration?" Molly asked.

"Only once, briefly, while Will was in jail for Hannibal's crimes."

"And your impression of him now?"

"Hannibal never had a finer student," Bedelia said. Molly understood the words as the warning Bedelia thought they were.

"Were you afraid when you traveled with Lecter as his drugged consort?" Molly asked.

"Constantly."

"I was never afraid of Will," Molly admitted. "He never said or implied anything that indicated I should be afraid."

"Then Will Graham is a better actor than Hannibal Lecter," Bedelia said. "The man I counseled was almost as terrifying as Hannibal himself."

Molly had never met Lecter and never hoped to but she could see why Will wouldn't have trusted Bedelia. Molly had come here hoping for an unbiased opinion and hadn't found that. The very way Bedelia breathed Lecter's name said much more than the woman herself. She was in love with Lecter and jealous of Will for holding Lecter's attention in a way she hadn't been able to.

"Will you take my advice and run?" Bedelia asked.

"No," Molly said, hiding her smile at Bedelia's surprise. Molly might not have learned what she wanted to learn but she was sure of one thing at least.

"Why not?"

"All that time you spent with him and were always afraid and never had his love," Molly said. "And even now you live in fear. I won't live my life that way. I can't."

"I suspect you won't live for long then."

"But I will," Molly said. "If they're alive, they won't come after me."

"You truly believe that?"

"I know that," Molly said. She stood, wrapping her coat back around her. "Thank you for seeing me, Dr. Du Maurier. I appreciate it." Molly knew she could explain why she was confident but didn't bother. Bedelia would never understand anyway.

Molly Foster Graham left Baltimore. She could sell her house from Oregon – do the paperwork via lawyer or email and fax. Her and Wally could stay at her parent's home for now and find a place soon. Something close by so Wally could ride his new pony often.

As much as she wanted to go to her and Will's home, she didn't. It was best she considered Will dead and herself a widow two times over. Will had made his choice standing on a cliff's edge. If he lived, and part of her hoped he didn't, then what was left belonged to someone else. Molly could grieve the death of her husband.

All these people lived in terrible fear of Hannibal Lecter and his reign of terror. All these people left behind with gaping holes in their lives. They all considered Will a part of Lecter and therefore worthy of that dread as well. What no one considered was what _she_ had taught Will the past two years. Love changed people. And Molly absolutely knew that she'd changed Will by loving him. 

Maybe, in the end, that would be enough to contain even a monster like Hannibal Lecter.

**Author's Note:**

> This is meant to be a pro-Molly story even though I'm a little rough on her. Let me know if I didn't convey that, would you?


End file.
